Your letters

Boys are in trouble long before GCSEs

Professor Bahram Bekhradnia blames the introduction of the GCSE for the increasing tendency for girls to outperform boys at all education levels but offers no serious evidence for this conjecture ("Tear up these exams or we are going to leave our boys behind", Comment, last week). By far the most likely explanation is that, in the English education system, girls always would have outperformed boys, had they not been held back in the past by low expectations and limited opportunities.

Most boys arrive at primary school with inferior linguistic and social skills to those of girls. Nor are their motor skills as well developed as those of girls. This means that, compared with girls, they do not respond well to the behavioural demands of school and do not succeed at reading and writing. Boysfrequently adopt the defensive attitude that success at school is an essentially female characteristic that need not concern them. That nearly all their teachers are women may well reinforce this perception. Instead of tinkering with the examination system, we should be examining the way boys are socialised and, even more, asking ourselves whether we inflict formal education on boysat much too early an age.Michael PykeCampaign for State Education Shenstone, Staffs

We initially welcomed the study that informed Bahram Bekhradnia's article. However, we question the values that drove it; this is not a report that celebrates women's achievements but, instead, prefers to make a problem of men's under-performance. In this construction, gender difference is reduced to a seesaw analysis - if one group is up, the other must be down. Prof Bekhradnia's report appears ill-informed by scholarship on gender and embodies a nostalgia for patriarchal patterns of participation in higher education. Prof Louise Morley and Prof Valerie HeyCentre for Higher Education and Equity Research, University of Sussex

New fathers often need help

Many new dads may find it liberating to hear they are not alone in struggling to bond with their baby ("Why new dads don't always love their baby", News, last week). However, Darin Strauss's view that all women are somehow "programmed to mother" is misleading. Either parent can experience negative feelings about their baby. For example, around one in 10 women will experience some symptoms of postnatal depression and this can make bonding with their baby more difficult.

It's equally true that many dads love getting to know their baby. A willingness to share in routine tasks, encouragement from their partner, and lots of interaction with their baby from day one, can make all the difference.

More worryingly, if any fathers (or, indeed, mothers) can identify with Michael Lewis's feelings of "hatred" toward their baby, they should seek help as soon as possible. There is a real risk that such feelings can spill over into actions that result in babies being harmed, intentionally or otherwise.

Last year, more than 4,600 calls to the NSPCC Helpline (0808 800 5000) were concerned with the everyday stresses of childcare. We need to recognise that both dads and mums may struggle to bond with their baby. Eileen HayesNSPCC parenting adviser, London EC2

Don't make excuses for BNP win

To dismiss the British National party's European electoral success as a protest vote brushes over what is plain for anyone black to see: Britain has a racist underbelly. To suggest that a vote for the BNP is merely a protest vote not only implies an inability among the electorate to distinguish between right and wrong but, more worryingly, provides a cover for those who hold racist views.

To describe the result as an aberration, as Sir Robert Atkins, the Tory MEP for the north-west of England, did provides yet further reasons for ignoring the obvious. Voting for the BNP is not a protest vote, nor is it linked to the recession and neither is it an electoral aberration. The quicker we accept this, the quicker we can start asking those BNP supporters to explain their decision as opposed to providing them with an excuse. Suﬁyan RanaManchester

So much for first past the post

William Keegan (Business, last week) fears proportional representation gives too much influence to minority parties. It is our existing voting system (first past the post) that gave unlimited power to the Conservatives under Margaret Thatcher and John Major for 18 years, and New Labour under Blair and Brown for 12, without any of them ever having the support of the majority of voters. It is FPTP which has enabled the monetarist experiment, mass privatisation, the invasion of Iraq, financial deregulation leading to the financial crisis - all carried out without the support of the majority. And William Keegan (whom I respect) is worried about proportional representation giving too much power to minority parties!C JohnsonLeicester

Black boxes can be easily recovered

Aviation accident expert Ronaldo Jenkins said that the jet that disappeared between Brazil and France may never be located ("Two bodies found from doomed Airbus", News, last week). But why are voice and data recorders still being placed on the body of the aircraft, where they are most likely to be vulnerable to fire or other damage?

Why can't they be designed with self-inflating flotation, similar to the mechanism that inflates airbags in motor vehicles? It would not take a great deal of technical ingenuity to design an explosive device like that used in pilots' ejection seats, that would propel these black boxes (or one combined voice and data recorder) away from the top of the plane at a 45-degree angle. The devices and ejection mechanisms could be in a sealed cell within the skin of the aircraft so that their activation would not compromise cabin pressure.Geoﬀ AdamCarlisle

Pay those who also wait properly

Thank you for Jamie Elliott's excellent article ("Waiters face sack if they ask diners for cash tips", News, last week). Waiting staff and customers are being conned by employers who charge for service. I would urge your readers always to delete the service charge and leave any tip in cash; this is the only way to ensure that the staff get it.Michael Ellman London N19

Don't condemn Silvio so swiftly

Barbara Ellen has added her voice to the media chorus calling Silvio Berlusconi a sleazeball or, to use her own word, a "saddo" ("Silvio, you're a saddo. Now just go away", Opinion last week). Nothing surprising there. Neither is it surprising that she would defend the press in any tussle with a democratically elected prime minister. However, she would do well to reflect a little on the methods used by the press to highlight sleaziness in others: those long-range lenses, for instance, that bypass any notion or hope of privacy

From a country whose recent contribution to the world has been, in equal measure, Britain's Got Talent and "Britain's Got Thieving Politicians", she should withdraw her pointing finger or at least redirect it nearer to home. As she says, we should all reflect on what some countries are lumbered with. Many of those that Ellen deems unfortunate are looking at Britain and doing just that.Helen Glave Florence

The fur is still flying

Last week, you published two magazines. One featured your Ethical Awards winners, including one for fashion; the other, Observer Woman Magazine, pictured a model wearing a fur coat. Not so ethical for you to print this photograph, and certainly not for this once beautiful animal.Judy HillBarnard Castle, Durham

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